


Great Expectations

by capeofstorm



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, temper tantrum
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-09
Updated: 2012-07-09
Packaged: 2017-11-09 12:38:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/455537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/capeofstorm/pseuds/capeofstorm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Moping, expectations and Astronomy Tower - the course of true love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Great Expectations

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Daniel_Black](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Daniel_Black).



“Harry is moping again,” she heard Ron say in a hush-hush voice as if the fact that Harry had another temper tantrum was a secret.

It wasn’t. Harry was in the common room when he started raging against Ron and Malfoy and she thought she heard her name in there as well, followed closely by Dumbledore’s and Ginny’s. When he realised everyone was looking at him, Harry shut up and stormed out of the room, slamming the portrait behind him.

Hermione was very well aware of that fact. Harry’s outburst made concentrating on her Arithmancy project very difficult. She looked up from her parchment and glared at Ron.

“Yes, I’ve noticed.”

Ron shuffled his feet and looked at the carpet.

“Don’t you think you should do something about that?”

Hermione took a deep breath and laid down her quill. She sat up straight, her hands in her lap and fixed Ron with an unflinching look. He blushed and coughed.

“Remind me, _Ronald,_ but I think Harry is your friend as well.”

“But ‘Mione, you’re better with him when he’s all emotional. I mean, you’re a girl – “

Hermione quirked an eyebrow. Ron shut up, his eyes widening when he realised he nearly put his foot in his mouth, again. She sighed and started putting her books away. Ron was right, she was the only one who could calm Harry down. It wasn’t the best job but it came with the territory, she guessed.

“Will you help me find him?”

Ron had the grace to look sheepish, his hand brushing his hair away from his eyes.

“Sorry, Lavender wanted to meet up and uh… study.”

Hermione snorted. Lavender and studying, that was a good one. She nodded and stood up, leaving her books on the table. No one would touch them. No one was stupid enough to risk her wrath.

“Right. Have fun while I’m getting blamed for causing the second world war,” she quipped and shook her head at Ron’s blank look.

She left the common room and walked towards the Astronomy Tower. The still had about three hours to dinner so the Tower would be empty. She knew it was Harry’s favourite spot to brood in. He certainly had the looks for a brooding character but he still was no Heathcliff. She giggled to herself. Really, she needed to stop thinking like that. People expected her to act mature and she always hated disappointing.

She opened the door to the tower and immediately spotted Harry. He was sitting on the ground, leaning against the wall, his knees drawn up, his head hidden in his arms which were propped on his legs. Ah, so whatever was troubling Harry was serious.

“Harry?”

She hesitated in the door. He looked like he wanted to be alone and while she usually denied him that chance the mope around, something told her to stay back until he acknowledged her. She trusted her instincts.

He raised his head and looked at her sadly. She immediately noticed he’s been crying and sighed. She stepped onto the Tower, her steps shortening the distance between them quickly. She dropped to her knees and hugged Harry. He lowered his legs and returned the embrace, pulling her closer and hiding his face in her hair. One of her hands found its way into his hair, while the other rubbed circles on his back. She closed her eyes against the sight of him. She hated seeing Harry in this state, she hated seeing him so hurt and caught up with the past, unable to move on. She started making shushing noises, her knees hurting from the cold stones, her hair flying around them like some sort of an exotic creature.

Harry’s hand tightened on her robes and he pulled her in tighter. She lost her balance and landed on him with a muffled oomph. Instead of scrambling away she moved around to find a better position and held on - it never came as a surprise to her that Harry needed physical reassurance when he was in one of his moods. She was happy to provide that, she really was but sometimes – more and more often now – her body betrayed her and started reacting differently to Harry’s innocent hugs. She grit her teeth and firmly told herself not to concentrate on that now, she had plenty of time for that later. So that’s how she found herself lying cradled in the V of Harry’s legs, his arms wrapped around her and her around him. She prayed fervently that no one would come up and see them like that. Harry really didn’t need another wave of gossip about him.

She was starting to freeze, her fingers becoming numb because of the wind. She lost track of time and was quite happy to stay in that position if it weren’t for Harry who released her robe and pulled away a bit. She raised her hand to brush away Harry’s hair – she needed to remind him to get a haircut soon, even though she preferred long hair on him – and smiled encouragingly. Harry sniffled and tried to grin back but failed miserably.

“What’s the matter?”

He just shook his head and closed his eyes, his hands tightening on her robes again. She cupped his cheek and sighed. She seemed to be doing that a lot around Harry lately.

“You know you can tell me,” she pleaded. _Let me fix it for you,_ she thought.

It seemed like she said something right – or terribly wrong. Harry opened his eyes and she gasped. He was beginning to get angry, his green eyes becoming darker by the second.

“You expect me to tell you, don’t you?”

She furrowed her brow, not knowing what he wanted but it seemed she didn’t need to answer him; Harry was working himself into a tirade.

“I’m just so sick of it, of all those expectations people have about me. They expect me to save them, they expect me to be like my father, to be reckless and brave and full of life and to be mourning for Sirius and taking my life more seriously. Ginny expects me to ask her out, hell, even Ron expects it! Dumbledore expects me to find clues about Riddle. Riddle, well, he expects me to drop dead. Mrs. Weasley is probably expecting me to join their family one day. You expect me to tell you everything and do my homework and Neville expects me to be the guy who gives him pep talk when he needs some confidence, the team expects me to come up with those brilliant strategies and I’m not Oliver Wood! And even Dobby – “

Hermione had enough. She covered Harry’s mouth with her palm and fixed him with a blank stare. It seemed she shocked Harry enough to stop him from doing anything. She took a deep breath and hoped she wouldn’t make it worse.

“Now listen to me, Harry James Potter. It is your life and no one else’s. Yes, people expect things from you but it doesn’t mean you have to make them happy. Yes, I expect something from you. Do you know what? Do you, Harry,” she inquired and continued as he shook his head no. “I expect you to be happy. Yes, I know, easy to say. But that’s all I want for you, Harry. If you being happy means that you’ll fail the year then so be it! I might rave at you for that, I might be disappointed with your choice but if it makes you happy then I will understand that. Do you know why? Because I love you. If you want to break school rules, marry Ginny, snog Malfoy or even tell Dumbledore to shove it up his ass then do it. But do it just because it makes you happy, love. In the end it’s all about you, not them. They can’t live their life for you and you can’t live your life making them happy.”

Sometime during her rant she removed her hand from his mouth and moved it to squeeze at his arm. He was looking at her with wide eyes, as if he was seeing her for the first time.

“But Volde – “

“Yes, Harry. That is something you have to do, I acknowledge that. But you have to do it so you can tell everyone else to suck it. You have to defeat him so you can do what you want. We all have to do things we don’t want in order to be able to do things we want to do. You can’t always have what you want but sometimes, just sometimes, you might get what you need.”

Harry’s mouth quirked at that. She smiled back knowing she could always count on Harry to understand her Muggle references. Harry looked at her quizzically, his eyes bright and happy, his mouth quirked into a grin. She could feel herself blushing under his stare and started squirming in their embrace.

“So you don’t expect me to be with Ginny, Hermione?”

She closed her eyes briefly and shook her head. She didn’t trust her voice enough, she was afraid she’d say something she’d regret if she opened her mouth. Something like _Why would you need Ginny when you have me?_

Harry slipped his arms around her, pulling her closer and hugging her to him. She shivered, the wind chilled her to the bone but somehow Harry was warm. She snuggled into his embrace and let herself enjoy it.

“And what about you, Hermione? Why do you do what people expect you to do?”

It was her turn to refuse to answer and simply hide her face in his robes.

“Ron sent you here and expected you to deal with me, didn’t he? You did it and yet you gave me this inspiring speech about doing things that you want to do and breaking free from other people’s expectations. Why is that, Hermione?”

If there was one thing she hated more than prejudice it was having her own words thrown back at her. She mulled over the question, knowing that Harry wouldn’t want her to answer straight away. He knew she liked to think things over before she voiced her opinion. He also knew she wasn’t the best when it came to confronting her own feelings and ideals. So he gave her time.

She felt Harry reach into her sleeve for her wand. He took it out, cast a warming spell on them and hid it back. It never failed to amaze her that Harry was able to use her wand. Ron wouldn’t even touch it, saying it was weird and just plain wrong to handle another wizard’s wand. She thought it was a silly pureblood stereotype but never asked him to lend her his wand ever again. She and Harry had no qualms about sharing their wands – something Ron attributed to them being raised in the Muggle world.

“I just want people to like me.”

Oh Merlin, did it really sound as pathetic as it sounded to her? She really shouldn’t have let that slip out. Now Harry will think Morgana knows what… She tensed, waiting for his reaction.

“But how can people like you if they don’t know the real you? If you do what they want you just make them like the image of you they have.”

Well, she certainly didn’t expect that one. How did Harry become so wise all of a sudden?

“I don’t want to be seen as selfish, Harry. You know how hard it was for me to get accepted. And even though I was accepted, I’m still being seen as the odd one out, even here in the magical world.”

She was not going to cry. She was not. She refused but it seemed the tears pooled in her eyes out of their own volition.

Somehow Harry’s hand ended up tangled in her hair. He tugged at it and she raised her head to look at him. He was looking at her in that strange way again and she didn’t know what to say.

“If they don’t accept you for who you truly are then they are all fools, Hermione.”

She rested her forehead in the crook of his neck, trying to hide her blush. Damn that boy for saying things like that to her. Damn him for giving her hope.

“I just hope you don’t expect me to end up with Ron.”

Oh for Merlin’s soggy left sock’s sake! It seemed that today she let things slip more easily. She felt Harry inhale sharply and furrowed her brow.

“You mean… You mean you don’t fancy Ron?”

“No. I used to but… It faded away, you know. I’m not one for deluding myself into something that’s not meant to be, you know that, Harry. Besides, he’s clearly happy with Lavender, as much as it pained me to admit at first.”

Harry chuckled at that. She smiled a little, remembering the tirades he was forced to listen to. When it came down to tirades she learned from the best.

“No, I don’t expect you to end up with Ron. I just expect you to be happy.”

She pulled away from Harry and smiled sweetly at him. Damn that boy for making her fall even more in love with him. She looked at the sky and noted with a start that it was dark already. She started getting up but Harry pulled her towards him again. She gave in easily, her arms going around his neck, her cheek pressed to his. She inhaled deeply and recognized the smell everywhere – her own, personal Amorentia. She chuckled at that thought.

“What’s so funny?”

Harry let her go and got up. She took his offered hand and hoisted herself up to her feet. She ran her hands along her robes to smooth the wrinkles and buy herself some more time.

“Nothing. I just thought we should do something people don’t expect us to do.”

Harry grinned at her.

“Like, oh I don’t know, start dating?”

She stood there, gaping at him. She couldn’t have heard him right… But the quickly disappearing smile told her otherwise. Harry asked her out!

“Harry…”

“No, forget it, Hermione, sorry, that was – “

“I don’t want to go out with you if you do it just to spite other people.”

 _Woah, where did that come from? Might as well take the chance,_ she thought as she reached out and took Harry’s hand, twining their fingers together.

“I want to go out with you because I’m in love with you.”

Her mouth definitely rebelled against her mind today. It was either that or she took the whole ‘don’t do what people expect from you’ thing way too seriously. She opened her mouth to take it back only to be beat by Harry who squeezed her hand.

“Good. ‘Cause that’s why I want to go out with you as well.”

Suddenly, the world looked much brighter.

“That’s good. Then I guess we’re going out,” she couldn’t help the ridiculously big grin that appeared on her face.

It seemed Harry wasn’t faring any better if judges by the size of his smile. He tugged on her hand and they moved towards the door. The dinner should be served soon and they had a statement to make. That made Hermione pause.

“Harry… You know this is going to hurt Ginny and piss Ron off, right?”

He nodded and tugged at her hand again. She moved to walk beside him, their hands entwined, their robes brushing against each other. It was foreign and new but at the same time reassuring and right. She wondered if it will always feel like that – she certainly hoped it would. She liked the feeling of his rougher skin against her.

“I know. But as you said, I can’t always make them happy. I don’t want to hide, Hermione. I want to be able to show people that I’m with you.”

Damn that boy for being so sweet! She squeezed his hand to show him she understood. It wasn’t going to be easy but she knew they would make it through. They always did and always will. They reached the entrance to the Great Hall and Harry looked at her, a mischievous smile playing on his lips.

“Are you ready for our grand entrance?”

She smiled a smile of her own and nodded.

“Bring it on, Potter.”


End file.
